Collective Nounimals
Word play & double entendre using the collective names of animals.
Escargatoire
Monsieur Noir and his family were running late, which greatly annoyed his wife. Eglantine hated having to rush, even when it was just the two of them. With the children in tow, it was downright chaotic. Sebastian seemed determined to render himself as filthy as possible in the hour prior to dinner, requiring an unnecessarily long bath. And Genevieve refused to go anywhere without her eyestalk bows (one of which Sebastian had unraveled and commissioned as a makeshift splint for brave Private Loeffler, injured in Friday's bedtime battle). By the time they left the house, Mme. Noir was so flustered she forgot to check the mailbox for the gloating postcard she'd been expecting any day now from Santorini. Her in-laws were nothing if not reliably boastful about their travels.
"For heaven's sake, Henri, slow down. They won't give our table away at this hour." Henri ignored this, causing his wife to glance at him nervously. "You did make a reservation, n'est-ce pas?"
"Of course, darling. But you know I don't like running into the Lacombes," he replied, pronouncing with obvious distaste the name of the neighbors who tended to be found, most Sunday nights, stationed in their usual spot near the club's front door. (Mme. Lacombe, it was rumored, suffered from agoraphobia, and thus preferred to have a clear escape route.) "Jacques is always so..." M. Noir cast about for the right word to express his disdain. "...familiar."
Eglantine didn't respond. Her husband's attitude towards les parvenus was nothing new, but it never failed to chafe her. She was, after all, from the 18th arrondissement herself, the daughter of working-class slugs. Henri's blue blood, cut to fifty percent by the time it coursed the veins of his children, occasionally drained from his heart and pooled, in a most ugly fashion, around his ego. It wasn't why she'd married him, that was for certain.
The family crawled in silence, the children absorbed in a competition to see who could leave the bigger trail behind them on the sidewalk. The game took all of their concentration and, Eglantine supposed, would leave them so dehydrated that dinner would be a multiple soda affair. Oh well, she thought. At least they're being quiet.
When they found themselves, a little while later, standing before the grand double doors of Gastropodapub, Henri paused to check his reflection in the glass. Smoothing his mustache, he addressed his wife without looking at her. "Remember cherie, je ne veux pas parler avec les Lacombes ce soir." And then, as if the idea had come to him like a pleasant memory forgotten, he leaned over to kiss her cheek.
Eglantine smiled and nodded wordlessly at her husband, still undeniably handsome even if the shine had long since faded from his shell. She ushered her young children into the restaurant's foyer, nicking a speck of pollen off Sebastian's back as he moved past. This was her family, and she loved them dearly.
Henri exchanged a few words with the hostess, who beckoned to the group a moment later with raised menus and a welcoming smile. "Noir, escargatoire of four?" Single file, they followed her through a dining room filled with the delicious aroma of soups, sauces, and other enticing fare.
Sunday dinner really was the best.
Charm
From the minute they set a date for the nestwarming party, Clarissa was worried. Never mind that there really wasn’t anything to worry about; that hadn’t stopped her before and it wouldn’t stop her now. Clarissa was happiest, Oro liked to say, when she had something to worry about.
“What if it rains?”
“Then we pivot and say it’s a hatchling shower."
"What if it's not finished?"
"Then we'll make everyone pitch in and help."
“What if no one shows up?”
“That would be lucky indeed.”
“Oro, stop teasing. You know I just want everything to be perfect.”
“Darling, it already is perfect. So perfect it’s almost cruel of us to show off.”
The nest, of course, had not yet been built—but Clarissa knew what he meant. Midsummer hung damp and sweet in the Amelanchier shrub where they perched. On every inch of every branch, paper white blossoms fluttered, a thousand stars against the deepening blue sky. Crickets harmonized with throaty, warty garden toads just out of sight. And above the yard, fireflies formed a lazy, meandering string of softy blinking bulbs.
The male goldfinch hopped closer to his mate, wordlessly letting his wing brush hers. It really was perfect, and no amount of her worrying would change that. Clarissa turned and tucked her head under Oro’s, admiring as ever the striking yellow plumage of his breast. One week, she assured herself. Before them lay the scatterings of what would become their nest: some bark chips, a length of twine, and a beakful of dandelion stems. Her third nest, but her first nestwarming. Oro’s entire flock of origin would be there. If it couldn’t be perfect, it had to come close.
- - -
The week flew by. Oro was responsible for fetching materials, but the actual nestbuilding was hen's work. Clarissa obsessed over every detail, chirping out requests of increasing specificity and difficulty that her mate cheerfully fulfilled.
"More thistle." Off Oro winged to the meadow.
"Cattails. Three big ones."
"Only three?" Several hours later, an exhausted, beak-sore Oro returned from his third trip to the pond, bits of cattail fluff stuck to his legs.
"I need some caterpillar silk."
"Of course, darling. I'll just pop down to the caterpillar silk shop."
Clarissa's efforts paid off; the nest was her best yet: cozy, sturdy, watertight. Still, she worried. Previous years had seen them living in sturdier, arguably safer environs: the dogwood at the lake, the sapling in the park. Never before had they chosen a backyard to start a family in. But the location couldn't be beat, and the human couple had no pets and no small children. What's more, Oro had glimpsed a large, unopened bag inside the shed.
"It's birdseed, Clarissa. I just know it is."
"Oro, you can't read. It could be garden soil. Or charcoal. Or poison!" Clarissa twittered and shivered, thinking of her future fledglings. "Are you sure this is a good idea? Maybe we should have stayed at the park with everyone else."
The male goldfinch smiled at his nestmate. "The only thing you should be worrying about," he said, "is coming up with the next batch of names."
- - -
The day of the party came calm and cloudless, extinguishing Clarissa's weather worries. She fussed about the Amelanchier, putting finishing touches on their branch and tugging bits of the nest into place. Oro meanwhile flitted around the yard, tidying up. Their shrub would only hold so much of the colony; the rest would have to alight on the surrounding trees, or even the grass.
When he saw the first finches arriving, Oro flew to Clarissa's side. "I know the clutch isn't even here yet," he said, "but I was wondering if you'd like to do this again in another few months?"
"Oh, Oro." Clarissa watched their friends, relations, and friends-of-relations descending from the clouds. The sun flashed on their sleek bodies, and she saw how they were like tiny gold charms on an invisible, perfectly linked chain of life.
It was a good day for a party.
Bloom
Smucker was sweating, and for once it wasn't from anxiety. A half-mile swim wouldn't normally be so taxing, but today he was weighed down by cargo. Shouldn't be much further now, he thought, wondering if lunch would be provided afterward. Thinking of the baby brine shrimp he'd had for breakfast made his coelenteron growl.
Just in time, the encouraging calls of the action leader rippled to him through the water. "Contract! Expel! Contract! Expel! You're doing great, jellies! We're almost to the reef!"
Smucker wiped his bell with his third tentacle and shifted the sea cucumber from his seventh to his eighth. It wriggled a little, but remained inside in. He'd been nervous about toting the delicate creature so far, especially since his nematocysts had been acting up. The last thing he needed was to accidentally sting the thing and have it eviscerate early in front of the entire bloom. Timing, they had been advised on this mission, was everything.
Project Rainbow was Smucker's first foray into environmental activism, though it was not motivated by starry-eyed idealism. He was as concerned as anyone else about the bleaching of the reef, but he also needed to make friends. His sister had seen the event promoted on Facebook, and it seemed as good an opportunity as any to work on his social phobia. With eight hundred other jellyfish participating, he'd be forced to interact with at least a few.
"You have to come out of your shell," his sister had chided him. "And it's for a good cause."
"Cnidaria don't have shells," he said. "But okay, I'll do it."
So, keeping his doubts about the operation to himself, he signed up. And now here he was, one among many. Ready to do his part. Happy to help. Hoping to connect.
A bump on his bell snapped him out of his reverie. "Sorry about that." Smucker looked up to see that the group had stopped. He'd collided with his nearest neighbor, a bloodybelly comb with thousands of exquisitely sparkling cilia. "I think we're here." The glowing red jelly nodded toward the sea floor.
Smucker looked down. The reef stretched out as far as his eye clusters could see. Not entirely white yet, but its faded hues were a pitiful sight. It was in desperate need of algae, and lots of it, if it was going to stand a chance of recoloring. Smucker was suddenly gripped by gravity of the quest. He glanced at the gelatinous blob beside him.
"I'm Smucker," he said, holding out his ninth tentacle.
"Bubble. Good to meet you."
"So, do you think this is actually gonna work?"
"Theoretically, it should. But it seems like a long shot to me. Either way, we're gonna get lunch out of it." Bubble winked at Smucker, who laughed.
Just then, a reverberating wave of shouted instructions reached them. "Jellies, prepare your cucumbers!" It was time.
Smucker and Bubble raised the bloated pickles they had carefully carried across the lagoon. Behind and above them, several hundred others did the same. The bloom of jellyfish waited, listening, united in the moment. Below them, the coral seemed to flex and splay its billions of spindly arms and fans, as if in anticipation of the drop.
"On three, everyone! One! Two! Three! NOW!"
And with that, eight hundred jellyfish squeezed eight hundred sea cucumbers, who inverted themselves instantly. Trillions of algae gushed from their spent bodies and floated down to the washed-out coral reef. The jellies watched and cheered as the microscopic organisms drifted slowly, finally settling into the ripples and facets of the coral. It would be weeks before they'd know if their efforts had any impact, but right now they reveled in the triumph of a job perfectly executed.
Bubble bobbed beside him. "Well, I guess that's that." They released their inside out cucumbers, who inched limply to join the others. They would be sore for a few days, but otherwise fine.
"They are feeding us now, right?" Smucker realized this was the most he'd conversed with anyone in recent memory. His sister was going to be proud.
"Hope so. I could destroy some phytoplankton. Hell, I could eat zooplankton right now. Did you see how fat my cucumber was? That sucker was heavy." Bubble rambled on, and Smucker felt a growing warmth that had nothing to do with the current that buoyed them along. As the pair of jellyfish floated companionably together towards their well-earned lunch, the sun's rays flashed and danced in the ocean blue, illuminating the bloom of a brand new jellyfish friendship.
Shiver
Berwick the shark had been functionally blind for almost two hundred years, but he’d be damned if that was going to stop him from giving his grandson, Lutzow, the best 150th birthday any Somniosus microcephalus had ever known. Lutz was now a full-grown Greenland shark, and a celebration was in order. So, despite Berwick himself being nearly five hundred years old, the two had set off on an adventure to mark the occasion. For the past month, Lutz and his grandfather had been slowly but steadily navigating the frigid water of the North Atlantic on their way to the Arctic Circle. Berwick had given his grandson a few different options for commemorating his maturity, but Lutz had been resolute in his choice. And so it was that shortly, the pair would be convening, along with thousands of other sharks, in the glacial meltwater of the 66th parallel to watch the 2026 summer Orcalympics.
“You’re sure you don’t want a trip to the Titanic instead?” Berwick had pressed. “When I was your age, exploring shipwrecks was all my friends and I wanted to do. Why, I remember the first time I saw the HMS Feversham, oh, must have been around 1880 or so, the hull was still completely intact, you wouldn’t believe how—”
“Grandpa,” Lutz had interrupted. “Wreckhopping hasn’t been cool for centuries. Besides, the portholes are too small. Only Sharpnoses and Lanterns can fit through them. And there’s nothing good to see on the outside. It’s just a giant heap of rusticles.”
Berwick had frowned, which caused the copepods on his eyes to wake and briefly bioluminesce. Like his grandfather, and like all the other first born males in their family, Lutzow had been named after a shipwreck. This was a great honor, Berwick was tempted to remind him, as wrecks were structures of immense value. They provided shelter and helped foster community—and that meant food. But he held his basihyal. The younger generations had different ideas about, well, everything. And Berwick, at the tender age of four hundred and seventy-three, was starting to feel a bit out of touch with them.
Case in point: his second idea for a birthday trip had been dismissed out of hand. Berwick had offered to take Lutz to see the Hibernia Platform in the Jeanne d’Arc Basin, but his grandson had been highly scornful.
“An oil rig?” Lutz had groaned. “Grandpa, what is there to do at an oil rig?”
Berwick could think of one thing at least, but he knew Lutz’s mother would be furious if he suggested it. Ramming the legs of the rig in hopes of toppling a delicious human or two into the water probably wasn’t an appropriate activity to model these days. Times really were changing.
When Berwick at last suggested the Orcalympics, Lutz couldn’t contain his excitement. The event was legendary among greenies, though fewer and fewer were making the long journey these days. Heavy maritime traffic and overfishing made for dangerous travel and scarcer prey along the way. It had taken Berwick some effort to convince Lutz’s parents to let him go.
“Are you sure? Grandpa, it’s so far! The Orcalympics! I can’t believe it! Seal tossing! Breaching! Kelping! Oh my god, the salmon hat event! The guys are gonna be shagreen with envy! Oh Grandpa, this is the best birthday present ever!”
Copepods or not, Berwick could see he’d made his grandson very happy.
- - -
They’d left almost immediately. Berwick’s poor vision meant Lutz had to scavenge for both of them, and the slowed-down AMOC would triple their travel time. The younger shark had grown into an excellent hunter, though he made his grandfather wait any time some strange new creature caught his eye. When that happened, Lutz couldn’t stop himself from investigating. The murky coastal depths he’d grown up in no longer held any surprises for him, but the further north they swam, the more exotic the wildlife. The cold, too, was a wonderful sensation. As a Greenland shark, Lutz certainly knew cold. But the frigid current flowing down from the arctic was something else altogether, and he couldn’t get enough of it.
Berwick, meanwhile, was a world-class tour guide. Blindness was no impediment to his deep, instinctual sense of direction, and along the way he educated his grandson on the landmarks and legends of the icy northern sea. He told Lutz about the hundreds of human expeditions his generation of sharks had witnessed from far below the waves.
“It’s a privilege,” said Berwick, “to belong to the only species living long enough to watch the whole of human history unfold, in their quest to explore.”
“Exploit is more like it,” said Lutz, somewhat bitterly.
“That too,” agreed Berwick, sadly.
Lutz was a smart shark. He knew that for every trading vessel that sat on the ocean floor, there were a dozen warships, too. He knew his home was being polluted and stripped of its resources every single day, and there was nothing he could do about it. It was part of why he admired the orcas so much. They, at least, were doing something about it. Lutz hoped the boat attacks would continue. Maybe he’d even get to see one on this trip…
“Hey,” said Berwick, changing the subject. “Keep an eye out for illhelvi. If the stories are true, they live around these parts. Wouldn’t want to come across one of those alone in the benthic.” He winked at his grandson—at least, he thought he did. He couldn’t be sure exactly, what with the parasites making it difficult to see.
It was at that moment that a great shadow spread over them. Lutz looked up and saw the silhouettes of hundreds—no, thousands—of sharks converging high above. Never in his life had he seen so many of his kind at once, and he realized they must have arrived at the Arctic’s southern border. That meant they were just hours away from the opening ceremony of the Orcalympics. Excitement overtook him, rippling through his milky grey body like electricity.
Close beside him, Berwick felt the shiver in the water. Unable to see what was happening at the water’s surface, he assumed his mention of the Icelandic evil whales had spooked Lutz. He tried to think of something reassuring to say that wouldn’t embarrass his grandson. One hundred and fifty wasn’t that old, after all. He was still just a kid, with centuries yet to go.
Business
Turkki and Teacup would always remember the day they fled the farmhouse, because it was the longest day of the year. Having decided to quit their jobs as pet ferrets, there were certain things the sisters nevertheless resolved to keep in place, and sticking to a crepuscular schedule was one of them. So when they overslept and missed their dawn window, they had fifteen long hours to wait until dusk. Teacup napped the time away, but Turkki used it to mentally rehearse the getaway.
It should be simple enough. When the boy came to top up their kibble, they’d war dance extra hard to show excitement. The boy would then let them out of the enclosure, so they could stretch their hindlimbs and burn off some energy. They’d play as usual, casually moving closer and closer to the Portal. Turkki would keep an eye out for the dog (who could come and go through the Portal at will), and Teacup would be on watch for the boy to look up from his black beepyflash toy (which was highly unlikely to happen). All they needed was a few seconds of distraction, and they could dash through the Portal and escape to Outside.
That is, if that’s where the Portal actually led to. Having never gone through it, they couldn’t be entirely sure. They were just following the instincts that had been awoken by the exciting outdoors smells the dog brought inside each day. When Turkki and Teacup sniffed his undercoat, they detected geosmin and ozone, and even the pheromones of other burrowing animals. They could almost taste the minerals in the sandy Wyoming soil that settled into his paw pads. It intoxicated them. It called to them. And it had convinced them to give up their cushy lives as kept creatures and chase new dreams—even if they didn’t yet know what those dreams were.
These were the thoughts on Turkki’s mind when she finally dozed off. It seemed like only moments later that the steel bars of the cage were rattling; the boy was refilling their food dish. Turkki kicked Teacup. “Wake up,” she whispered. “Go time.”
The sisters bounced into action, arching their backs and hopping frenetically to and fro. They twisted and tumbled, sending their fleece beds flying, and splashing the water from their bowls. The boy quickly unlatched the door, and the sisters exchanged a meaningful look as they carried their antics out of the cage and into the front room of the farmhouse. Turkki glanced at the Portal, but she could see no signs of the dog. She scampered and skipped, inching closer to the smooth plastic flap. Until this moment, she’d never thought about the weight of the flap. Would they be able to lift it with their tiny bodies? They’d have to charge through side by side to have the best chance.
Teacup, meanwhile, was dancing and dooking softly, trying not to draw the attention of the boy (who had already plopped onto the couch with his beepyflash). She kept her eyes on him as she jumped backwards towards her sister, who was now just bouncing in place. But the boy was fully absorbed in his toy. It was now or never.
Just then, a shiny black nose came poking through the Portal, followed by a set of velvety jowls, two droopy ears, and a pair of inquisitive canine eyes. As was his custom, the dog was first checking to see if anything interesting was happening in the farmhouse before committing to coming inside. His head raised the plastic flap, leaving just enough space for two ferrets to slip through, which is exactly what they did, when the idea struck them both at the same time—which is a thing that can happen when you’re lucky enough to have a twin sister.
In a flash, the ferrets were gone, pets no more. The dog reared back out of the Portal and spun around, barking. But assuming they were just off to explore (as he himself did all day), he didn’t trouble himself too much about them, and went inside to perform his nightly inspection of the kitchen trash.
Meanwhile, Turkki and Teacup bounded across the prairie, hearts pounding, as their every sense came bursting to life with an intensity known only to newly free animals. The setting sun cast long shadows that ran close behind them, but the sisters looked only ahead.
- - -
“Lindy! Lucas! Snack time!”
Teacup set two strips of prairie dog jerky on the packed dirt floor of the burrow. The kits would come get the food when they were ready. At the moment, the pair were locked in a furry jumble of tooth and tail, deep in the kind of play session that War Dance Kitcare Center encouraged. After all, that had been another of the behaviors that she and Turkki had been determined to keep up, despite transitioning from tame to feral. It hadn’t always been easy to find the time. The daily pressures of hunting and the stress of staying safe Outside took their toll. But it was an important part of skill-building in a dangerous world, not to mention essential to bonding and socialization. Naturally it would be central to their curriculum.
Teacup marveled to think of all they’d accomplished in just two months. The kitcare center had been entirely Turkki’s idea. It was her sister who quickly identified the need for one to support the jills of the local black-footed population. She’d worked tirelessly to lay the undergroundwork, spending countless sunrises and sunsets introducing herself to everyone she met in the prairie’s vast tunnel system. That had been perhaps the biggest culture shock of all: the degree to which wild ferrets were solitary, even in kitrearing.
“Teacup,” she’d said, her eyes shining with entrepreneurial vision. “Their lives would be so much easier if they had someone to watch the kits while they hunt. We could teach basic skills like digging and stashing—oh, and shivering!” Teacup had been all in, of course, and had done everything she could to help launch the venture. It was Teacup who’d found the vacant burrow and done much of the work to convert it to a kit-friendly space. And it was Teacup who acted as main caretaker to Lindy and Lucas—as yet the center’s first and only students—while Turkki continued to drum up new clients.
Speaking of Lindy and Lucas, they had finally worn one another out and had moved on to snacking. As usual, Lindy’s excitement could not be contained, and she burst into a series of nonsensical squeaks that continued between bites. The little white kit was a handful, and Teacup had loved her silly personality from the minute she’d first arrived at the burrow’s entrance.
“Tiki!” she’d shouted merrily, mispronouncing her new teacher’s name. “Perky!” she’d shrieked, rolling into a ball on the floor and giggling wildly. “Perky turkey-keyyyyyy!”
“I think she means you,” Teacup had nudged Turkki, trying not to laugh.
“Vocalization,” Turkki had said. “Put it on the lessons list.”
Lucas had been an entirely different story, though equally lovable in his own way. Like Lindy, he’d been deposited at the center by a harried-looking jill. The sisters had reassured her that her little one would be happy as a weasel at an easel in their care, and she could come collect him whenever she was ready. Lucas had looked none too sure himself, though, and had gone to the corner and curled up tighter and tighter, desperate to disappear, until he was barely the size of a pinecone.
But Teacup needn’t have worried, because Lindy was far too excited to have a playmate to let Lucas be alone for a single minute much less be unnecessarily afraid. It wasn’t long before the two were inseparable.
Teacup was watching the furry friends munch their meatsticks when she suddenly heard rustling in the tunnel outside. Expecting Turkki and no one else, she froze when the noise grew louder—it was more scuffling and shuffling than her sister alone would make. Multiple sets of paws? One big set? She was about to send the kits out the back entrance when she recognized Turkki’s voice.
A moment later, her sister’s happy face appeared. And she wasn’t alone. Peeking their noses in curiously were three jills and their litters—twelve kits in total. Teacup gasped. She locked eyes with her twin sister, as once again they shared a thought at the exact same moment: it was real now. Not just two kits but a whole school’s worth. Their hard work was paying off.
Turkki herded the group into the warm, tidy burrow. She knelt down and spoke softly to the tiny, wide-eyed kits. “Welcome to War Dance,” she said, and smiled up at their mothers. “Where fun is serious business.”